NASHVILLE – As Sarah Palin left the stage at the inaugural National Tea Party Convention here Saturday night, the crowd erupted into chants of “Run Sarah Run!”
“I think you like her!” said Judson Phillips, the chief organizer of the convention, when the ovation finally stopped and people had stepped down from the chairs where they had been standing and waving flags.
Ms. Palin gave the Tea Party crowd exactly what they wanted to hear, declaring the primacy of the Tenth Amendment in limiting government powers, complaining about the bailouts and the “generational theft” of rising deficits, and urging the audience to back conservative challengers in contested primaries.
“America is ready for another revolution!” she told the crowd, prompting the first of several standing ovations.
The speech was closely watched as a potential signal of Ms. Palin’s political future and the extent to which the convention would embrace her. But Ms. Palin, while aligning herself firmly with the Tea Party, nevertheless urged the 1,100 delegates who had gathered in a hotel ballroom not to let the movement be defined by any one leader.
“This is about the people, and it’s bigger than any one king or queen of a tea party, and it’s a lot bigger than any charismatic guy with a teleprompter,” she said.
That was just one of several digs at President Obama. “How’s that hopey-changey thing workin’ out for you?” she asked at one point. She blasted him for rising deficits, “apologizing for America” in speeches in other countries, and for allowing the so-called Christmas bomber to board a plane headed for the United States, saying he was weak on the war on terrorism.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/07/us/politics/08palin.html?hp